Ministry of Communications and the Ministry of Health disrupted the project of connecting hospitals to a unified healthcare system

According to the Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation, the Ministry of Communications and the Ministry of Health disrupted the deadlines for connecting hospitals and polyclinics to the Internet and creating a regulatory framework for the work of the Unified State Health Information System (UGISZ). In the future this will entail additional expenditures from the budget.

The auditors of the Accounting Chamber were informed about this in a letter to Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich, Kommersant reports with reference to the document.

The Ministry of Communications received 5.4 billion rubles from the government's reserve fund for connection to the high-speed Internet of doctors' workplaces in 2017. The joint venture was informed that the agency managed to master only 35% of these funds. In 2018, the ministry was to receive another 4.9 billion rubles, but the Finance Ministry blocked this tranche. Also, the Ministry of Communications failed to determine the only provider for connecting clinics, and also used outdated data on the cost of such works. As a result, their price was overestimated by 25-67%, reported in the joint venture.

"Providers" of clinics - Rostelecom - auditors accuse of misappropriation of 2 billion rubles. For example, instead of medical institutions, veterinary clinics could be connected to the Internet. At the same time, the schedule of connections for February 2018 was not compiled, the JV stated.

In addition, the auditors calculated that the actual profit of PJSC "Rostelecom" was 30% of the contract price, that is, 589 million rubles. "The Ministry of Communications of Russia in substantiating the contract price used irrelevant data on the cost of these works, which significantly exceed current market prices," said Vera Chistova, deputy chairman of the joint venture.

To the Ministry of Health, the SP had questions about the regulatory framework governing the work of the EGIS. The Office has not yet developed all the documents, which means that auditors note that in the future they will have to be "adjusted" to the already launched information systems. All these problems will entail additional expenditures of the federal budget.

On the instruction of the President of Russia Vladimir Putin, by 2019 all hospitals and polyclinics of the country should be connected to the Internet. Three agencies are responsible for the project: the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Communications and the Ministry of Finance.